It’s been a while…

The world is all white noise at the moment,
One moment sliding into the next in a never-ending stream.
Seventeen hour days between two jobs,
All to make the ends tenuously meet.

I’m tired, I’m sore, and yet I go on,
Because I cannot and will not stop,
Others depend on me now,
And so I keep going.

I pray that someday I will be able to stop,
Working so hard to pay others for my past decisions.
I have a plan, a budget, and faith in God,
Along with the greatest supporter at my back.

So I can keep going, I can still work.
I’ll take my rest where I can find it.
I recharge my batteries in the arms of my beloved,
and put on my work shoes to do it again.

The Construction of a dream…

A dream is a tricky thing,

An elusive spirit described solely in abstracts,

An intangible ghost quantified by rough comparison.

 

A dream has no flesh, save for what we think it ought to,

It has no breadth, except that which we use to give it dimension,

It has no bones, but for the ones we build into it.

 

A dream is a forever evasive quarry,

A prey that leads us further away from our expectations,

A predator feigning its desire for domestication.

 

To build a dream is an exercise in both compromise and futility,

It is a practice of reaching for both what is beyond possible, and well in hand,

It is an art of finding the contented balance between what is and should be.

 

To build a dream takes a vision both clear and obscured,

It takes looking without fear and because of it.

It requires gazing into the void of both chaos and order.

 

To build a dream demands losing everything and nothing,

It risks valuables present, past, and future,

It requires sacrifice, even of itself.

 

The construction of a dream is the realization of impossible coexistence,

The awakening to stubborn compromise and deep seeded change,

The concession to perfect adherence and unlimited acquiescence.

 

The construction of a dream begins and ends with its own demise,

The transition of infallible possibility to quantifiable fragility,

The metamorphosis from endless beginning to beginning without end.

 

The construction of a dream is a never finished project,

An endless rough draft of rewrites, revisions, and retouches,

An infinite list of things that will never be perfectly finished.

 

And to accept its never-ending nature, means the construction can end.

So I go on…

My life unfolds, uncertain at the path before me,
I have but one notion, forward.
So I go on.

The past heartaches, headaches, and defeats,
Were but signs that lead me to now.
I stumble onward, ever unsure, listening,
To the only notion that I know, forward.
So I go on.

I reflect on the way that leads me to now,
The choices, both made and missed,
The words both held and kept silent,
The feelings both repressed and expressed,
The aches both present and past.
I sift through the ashes of those old bridges,
Long since burnt and turned cold.
I see the signs of damage, and recognize
That some belongs to my sharpest weapon.
I see the ghosts of my choices and the specters,
Of worlds that might have been.
Yet I grow tired of the sifting and picking and dwelling,
The notion I know hums in me again, forward.
So I go on.

Possibilities, desires, wants, and dreams flash before me,
Winking in and out of existence like the dance of fireflies,
Priorities, needs, the feeling of both joyous relief and impending doom.
They fill my head with a cacophony of swirling noise,
Overwhelm my heart with a sea of emotions,
Until I cannot hold them anymore.
So I push them all aside, and focus on the persistent hum,
The singular beat of the only certain notion.
Forward.
So I go on.

And so I face the horizon, uncertain of what lies beyond,
The next rise, the next mountain, the next traveler,
I take a step, breath in and out, letting the drumbeat carry me,
Letting the hum of certainty take me forward.
And so I go on.